(no subject)
Title: Expand, Contract [2/?]
Author:
more_awake, formerly abcdana
Rating: PG-ish
Pairing/Character: Mark (and a supporting cast of Archer, Sam, and Naomi, with the rest of the Oceansiders coming in later)
Summary: In the aftermath of Addison's sudden death, Mark is left to grieve and raise their newborn daughter with the help of Addison's brother, friends, and the words she left behind. Set in an AU in which Addison kept the baby and went straight from NYC to LA after leaving Mark instead of taking a year-long detour in Seattle.
Previous chapter: here
Disclaimer: All television shows, movies, books, and other copyrighted material referred to in this work, and the characters, settings, and events thereof, are the properties of their respective owners. As this work is an interpretation of the original material and not for-profit, it constitutes fair use. Reference to real persons, places, or events are made in a fictional context, and are not intended to be libelous, defamatory, or in any way factual.
Chapter Two
xx
He wakes to tiny, shrill cries emanating from a frilly white bassinet just a few feet away in the dark. It doesn’t feel like he fell asleep that long ago, and a glance over at the alarm clock tells him that, yes, it has only been about 45 minutes since he got his daughter back to sleep for the first time since bringing her home to Addison’s. In a perfect world, he would be able to roll over to the person sleeping next to him and mumble, “Your turn,” but instead, he is sleeping in bed alone, and he is the only person responsible for making those cries stop.
“I’m coming,” Mark mumbles, rolling out of the bed in one of Addison’s guest rooms and walking with slumped posture towards the source of the noise: Aurora is lying on her back in the bassinet wearing a pink cotton sleeper, kicking her legs, and clenching her little fists near her face as she screams.
“Okay. Round two. Here we go,” he encourages himself out loud. Taking a deep breath, he carefully scoops up the red-faced infant and holds her against him, tucking her head under his chin and allowing her to curl up against his chest as she continues to wail. When she woke up earlier, her problem was obvious; she needed a diaper change. This time around, though, he isn’t sure what it is.
“Hey, shhh… come on. You’re okay. Everything is okay,” he murmurs awkwardly, still unsure of how he is supposed to talk to a baby and fully knowing that things really are not okay. “Shhh… please. I want to be able to do this without help.”
He has plenty of help nearby-Archer, Sam, Naomi, and Maya are all staying over for a week or so-but he feels like he needs to be able to prove to himself early on that he can do this alone. So he begins to pace back and forth across the darkened room, rubbing her back and talking to her softly, just as he had for Addison whenever she was upset about something. He is really trying, but a few minutes pass, and Aurora still isn’t responding to any of it. In fact, his attempts at soothing only seem to be upsetting her more.
“Need some help?” A voice from behind him asks in an elevated whisper. Turning around, he sees a tired-looking Naomi leaning against the doorframe in her pajamas, holding one of Aurora’s blankets, and immediately, he feels a mixture of guilt and embarrassment. Relying on others is something Mark has never been comfortable with, and even though he knows that Naomi is more than happy to assist for the second time tonight, it still doesn’t feel right.
“I’m sorry,” he tells her as she approaches. He wishes he that didn’t have to be taught how to care for his own child. “I thought I could handle it myself this time, but I can’t get her to stop.”
“Don’t worry about it. I wasn’t sleeping anyway. Here,” she offers, reaching out to take the baby. Naomi settles Aurora in her arms with ease, resting the little girl’s head against her shoulder and covering her tiny body with a soft yellow blanket. Immediately, she seems to know what the crying is all about: “When was the last time she ate?”
His heart sinks. No wonder she’s so upset. He should have been able to figure that one out himself. Of course she has to eat-it’s been about three and a half hours.
“Oh, crap.” The palm of his right hand goes straight to his forehead, and his fingers reach up to pull at his hair. “God, she’s probably starving. I’m an idiot.”
“Hey, it’s okay. She’ll never let you forget to feed her for long, so I don’t think you have to worry about starving her,” she assures him over Aurora’s cries. “Go ahead and warm up a bottle. I’ll see if I can calm her down a little.”
He nods and turns to walk out of the bedroom, feeling defeated. Failure number one. He should have known.
As he navigates his way to the kitchen, bare feet sticking to the wood floor with each step, he can’t help but take notice of his moonlit surroundings. It is so odd to be in this house. Everything inside is so completely Addison-the colors, the furniture, the decorative wall hangings. The house even smells like her. It’s nothing like the brownstone in New York, but it is still very much like her.
And it’s kind of painful.
But he keeps moving, knowing that if he stops to take everything in, his emotions will get the best of him.
Just before entering the kitchen, though, he pauses upon noticing that the outside lights are on in the backyard. Through the French doors, he can see Archer laying motionless on one of the reclining deck chairs with his arms crossed, staring out at seemingly nothing, just as he has been since the sun set hours ago. If Mark didn’t have a crying baby waiting for him, he would consider going outside to grab his own chair, but instead, he continues into the kitchen where he finds that even the contents of the refrigerator screams ‘Addison.’
There are several pre-filled bottles on the bottom shelf for Aurora, but on the middle shelf, there is a large slice of chocolate cake covered in plastic wrap, a half-finished cheesecake, and a never-opened carrot cake. She always loved any kind of cake, and that love seems to have gone into overdrive during her pregnancy. He lets out a small laugh at the thought of how… cute… she would have looked, imagining her laughing with Naomi in the living room with her feet up on her coffee table and a plate of cheesecake balanced on her rounded stomach. He wishes he could have been here to see that, to have lived with her through all of it, and the more he imagines everything, the more the hurt builds until he remembers that his daughter needs him. Shaking his head to stop the thoughts, he grabs a bottle off the bottom shelf and quickly shuts the door.
While he waits for the bottle warmer to do its job, he collapses into one of the kitchen chairs and buries his face into his crossed arms on the table in order to take a quick five-minute nap; on top of feeling overwhelmed and emotionally gutted, he is also suffering from some serious jet lag. It’s 5 am in New York, so he feels like he has been awake all night. He shuts his eyes and inhales deeply through his nose, focusing his thoughts on breathing. In, out. Expand, contract. Everything will be okay.
All too soon, the timer beeps, and reluctantly, he pulls himself out of the chair, grabs the bottle, and begins the walk back to the guest room, skylights illuminating his path. He tries not to pay attention to his surroundings at all this time, but as he gets closer to his destination, he can’t help but notice Addison’s room at the end of the hallway. The closed white double doors reflect the outside light seeping in and have an almost hypnotizing glow in the darkness. He almost stops just to stare, but Aurora’s whimpers urge him to continue.
“I’m back,” he announces, pushing open the guest room door to find Naomi sitting on the bed, slowly rocking back and forth with Aurora who is now swaddled comfortably in her yellow blanket.
“Hey,” Naomi greets him as she glances up from the fussy baby. “She’s still a little upset, but some food will change that.”
He moves to sit down next to her, and she carefully transfers the little girl into his arms. The change in position initially upsets her, but as soon as Mark puts the bottle to her lips, Aurora latches on immediately. Her cries stop, and the room is suddenly silent as she begins to eat frantically, barely stopping to breathe. She was so obviously hungry, and he feels incredibly sorry for making her wait so long between meals.
“Thank you,” he says, looking over at Naomi. He says it as sincerely as possible because he knows she is hurting, too, and he truly appreciates that she is so willing to help despite all that she must be feeling. “I’m sorry that I couldn’t figure this out on my own.”
“You don’t have to apologize, Mark. It’s your first night. Caring for a baby is something that takes a little practice, and we are all happy to help.” She offers him a small smile. “Do you want me to sit here with you while she eats?”
“You can go ahead and sleep. I think I’m going to try it solo this time,” he decides. “Thank you, though. Really. She would still be screaming and I would still be clueless if you hadn’t been here.”
“Not a problem. If you need anything, just walk across the hall. I’ll leave the door open a little bit,” she whispers as she stands up to leave.
“Okay.”
“Sweet dreams, baby girl,” she coos, lightly brushing her fingers across Aurora’s rosy cheek before looking back to Mark. “I’ll come see you guys again the next time I hear her wake up, okay?”
He nods. He wants to say that he can handle her himself, but he knows that probably isn’t true. Not yet, at least. “Thank you.”
Naomi leaves, closing the door part way behind her. Now it’s just the two of them, father and daughter.
“I’m really sorry about this, kid,” Mark whispers apologetically as he carefully shifts so that he can sit up against the, thankfully, padded headboard of the bed. “I’m still learning here, but I promise I won’t make that mistake again.”
Aurora responds with a small noise, stopping for a moment to catch her breath and then going straight back to eating. He looks down at her, in awe of how small she looks when cradled in his arms. It’s amazing. She wasn’t even here a few days ago, and now, here she is-snuggled against him, eating, breathing, living, perfect. It’s surreal.
But it is also agonizingly bittersweet.
A few days ago, he was trying to ignore Addison’s approaching due date, and right now, he is 3000 miles away, living in her Spanish-style Santa Monica home, figuring out how to care for their newborn daughter, and dealing with the aftermath of her death. A few days ago, Addison was alive and blissfully happy, a woman so looking forward to motherhood, and now… she isn’t anything.
Just as he thinks he can’t take this reality for another second, Aurora gurgles, and his attention is back on her. While he zoned out, he must have shifted her oddly because she now has a trail of formula and baby drool dribbling out of her mouth and down her chin. Or maybe she just spit up. He doesn’t know, but he repositions her a little anyway, and she calmly and contently goes back to eating. Her eyes peek over the top of her bottle, and she gazes up at him, blinking sleepily as she had the very first time he held her. He knows that he probably looks like a fuzzy blob to her at this point in her life, but there is something comforting about the way her little eyes look at him. It’s the same comfort he feels when she wraps her little hand around one of his fingers, and despite the fact that he doesn’t always know what she needs yet, he likes to think it means she likes him. Outside of the OR, people typically do not have a lot of faith in him, and really, that is mostly his fault, but Aurora seems to have an innate trust in him. He just hopes he doesn’t somehow ruin it. He wants to be different, someone she can look up to, because she has already lost so much. He wants to keep her safe. He wants to be able to give her the life Addison would have wanted to give her. He just isn’t sure how to do it.
“Listen, I know we don’t know each other very well yet, but you’re still my daughter, and I… I love you,” he murmurs quietly, knowing that the last (and only other) person he said those three words to was Addison. This is the first time he has been alone with his little girl long enough to actually talk to her, and it feels both strange and completely natural at the same time. “I honestly don’t know how we are going to do this without your mom, but we don’t really have a choice, so if you could please be a good kid and try to fight off all of your Sloan genes and all of the Montgomery genes that can make Archer such a pain in the ass, I would really appreciate it. I need all the help I can get,” he tells her. “I’m glad you’re here, though. I know that the mood around here sucks, and everyone is so caught up in other stuff right now when the attention should all be on you, but we really are happy to have you. Really. And I hope you know that.”
She falls asleep minutes after finishing her bottle, but instead of immediately placing her back in the bassinet, he feels compelled to hold her for a little longer, studying her features and watching her breathe. What he feels for her already is indescribable, and he wants to make sure she knows that he is here and that she is safe, wanted, and loved. His own parents never gave him that, so if he can somehow convey that to her, he knows it’s at least a decent start.
xx
Next chapter: here
Author:
more_awake, formerly abcdana
Rating: PG-ish
Pairing/Character: Mark (and a supporting cast of Archer, Sam, and Naomi, with the rest of the Oceansiders coming in later)
Summary: In the aftermath of Addison's sudden death, Mark is left to grieve and raise their newborn daughter with the help of Addison's brother, friends, and the words she left behind. Set in an AU in which Addison kept the baby and went straight from NYC to LA after leaving Mark instead of taking a year-long detour in Seattle.
Previous chapter: here
Disclaimer: All television shows, movies, books, and other copyrighted material referred to in this work, and the characters, settings, and events thereof, are the properties of their respective owners. As this work is an interpretation of the original material and not for-profit, it constitutes fair use. Reference to real persons, places, or events are made in a fictional context, and are not intended to be libelous, defamatory, or in any way factual.
Chapter Two
xx
He wakes to tiny, shrill cries emanating from a frilly white bassinet just a few feet away in the dark. It doesn’t feel like he fell asleep that long ago, and a glance over at the alarm clock tells him that, yes, it has only been about 45 minutes since he got his daughter back to sleep for the first time since bringing her home to Addison’s. In a perfect world, he would be able to roll over to the person sleeping next to him and mumble, “Your turn,” but instead, he is sleeping in bed alone, and he is the only person responsible for making those cries stop.
“I’m coming,” Mark mumbles, rolling out of the bed in one of Addison’s guest rooms and walking with slumped posture towards the source of the noise: Aurora is lying on her back in the bassinet wearing a pink cotton sleeper, kicking her legs, and clenching her little fists near her face as she screams.
“Okay. Round two. Here we go,” he encourages himself out loud. Taking a deep breath, he carefully scoops up the red-faced infant and holds her against him, tucking her head under his chin and allowing her to curl up against his chest as she continues to wail. When she woke up earlier, her problem was obvious; she needed a diaper change. This time around, though, he isn’t sure what it is.
“Hey, shhh… come on. You’re okay. Everything is okay,” he murmurs awkwardly, still unsure of how he is supposed to talk to a baby and fully knowing that things really are not okay. “Shhh… please. I want to be able to do this without help.”
He has plenty of help nearby-Archer, Sam, Naomi, and Maya are all staying over for a week or so-but he feels like he needs to be able to prove to himself early on that he can do this alone. So he begins to pace back and forth across the darkened room, rubbing her back and talking to her softly, just as he had for Addison whenever she was upset about something. He is really trying, but a few minutes pass, and Aurora still isn’t responding to any of it. In fact, his attempts at soothing only seem to be upsetting her more.
“Need some help?” A voice from behind him asks in an elevated whisper. Turning around, he sees a tired-looking Naomi leaning against the doorframe in her pajamas, holding one of Aurora’s blankets, and immediately, he feels a mixture of guilt and embarrassment. Relying on others is something Mark has never been comfortable with, and even though he knows that Naomi is more than happy to assist for the second time tonight, it still doesn’t feel right.
“I’m sorry,” he tells her as she approaches. He wishes he that didn’t have to be taught how to care for his own child. “I thought I could handle it myself this time, but I can’t get her to stop.”
“Don’t worry about it. I wasn’t sleeping anyway. Here,” she offers, reaching out to take the baby. Naomi settles Aurora in her arms with ease, resting the little girl’s head against her shoulder and covering her tiny body with a soft yellow blanket. Immediately, she seems to know what the crying is all about: “When was the last time she ate?”
His heart sinks. No wonder she’s so upset. He should have been able to figure that one out himself. Of course she has to eat-it’s been about three and a half hours.
“Oh, crap.” The palm of his right hand goes straight to his forehead, and his fingers reach up to pull at his hair. “God, she’s probably starving. I’m an idiot.”
“Hey, it’s okay. She’ll never let you forget to feed her for long, so I don’t think you have to worry about starving her,” she assures him over Aurora’s cries. “Go ahead and warm up a bottle. I’ll see if I can calm her down a little.”
He nods and turns to walk out of the bedroom, feeling defeated. Failure number one. He should have known.
As he navigates his way to the kitchen, bare feet sticking to the wood floor with each step, he can’t help but take notice of his moonlit surroundings. It is so odd to be in this house. Everything inside is so completely Addison-the colors, the furniture, the decorative wall hangings. The house even smells like her. It’s nothing like the brownstone in New York, but it is still very much like her.
And it’s kind of painful.
But he keeps moving, knowing that if he stops to take everything in, his emotions will get the best of him.
Just before entering the kitchen, though, he pauses upon noticing that the outside lights are on in the backyard. Through the French doors, he can see Archer laying motionless on one of the reclining deck chairs with his arms crossed, staring out at seemingly nothing, just as he has been since the sun set hours ago. If Mark didn’t have a crying baby waiting for him, he would consider going outside to grab his own chair, but instead, he continues into the kitchen where he finds that even the contents of the refrigerator screams ‘Addison.’
There are several pre-filled bottles on the bottom shelf for Aurora, but on the middle shelf, there is a large slice of chocolate cake covered in plastic wrap, a half-finished cheesecake, and a never-opened carrot cake. She always loved any kind of cake, and that love seems to have gone into overdrive during her pregnancy. He lets out a small laugh at the thought of how… cute… she would have looked, imagining her laughing with Naomi in the living room with her feet up on her coffee table and a plate of cheesecake balanced on her rounded stomach. He wishes he could have been here to see that, to have lived with her through all of it, and the more he imagines everything, the more the hurt builds until he remembers that his daughter needs him. Shaking his head to stop the thoughts, he grabs a bottle off the bottom shelf and quickly shuts the door.
While he waits for the bottle warmer to do its job, he collapses into one of the kitchen chairs and buries his face into his crossed arms on the table in order to take a quick five-minute nap; on top of feeling overwhelmed and emotionally gutted, he is also suffering from some serious jet lag. It’s 5 am in New York, so he feels like he has been awake all night. He shuts his eyes and inhales deeply through his nose, focusing his thoughts on breathing. In, out. Expand, contract. Everything will be okay.
All too soon, the timer beeps, and reluctantly, he pulls himself out of the chair, grabs the bottle, and begins the walk back to the guest room, skylights illuminating his path. He tries not to pay attention to his surroundings at all this time, but as he gets closer to his destination, he can’t help but notice Addison’s room at the end of the hallway. The closed white double doors reflect the outside light seeping in and have an almost hypnotizing glow in the darkness. He almost stops just to stare, but Aurora’s whimpers urge him to continue.
“I’m back,” he announces, pushing open the guest room door to find Naomi sitting on the bed, slowly rocking back and forth with Aurora who is now swaddled comfortably in her yellow blanket.
“Hey,” Naomi greets him as she glances up from the fussy baby. “She’s still a little upset, but some food will change that.”
He moves to sit down next to her, and she carefully transfers the little girl into his arms. The change in position initially upsets her, but as soon as Mark puts the bottle to her lips, Aurora latches on immediately. Her cries stop, and the room is suddenly silent as she begins to eat frantically, barely stopping to breathe. She was so obviously hungry, and he feels incredibly sorry for making her wait so long between meals.
“Thank you,” he says, looking over at Naomi. He says it as sincerely as possible because he knows she is hurting, too, and he truly appreciates that she is so willing to help despite all that she must be feeling. “I’m sorry that I couldn’t figure this out on my own.”
“You don’t have to apologize, Mark. It’s your first night. Caring for a baby is something that takes a little practice, and we are all happy to help.” She offers him a small smile. “Do you want me to sit here with you while she eats?”
“You can go ahead and sleep. I think I’m going to try it solo this time,” he decides. “Thank you, though. Really. She would still be screaming and I would still be clueless if you hadn’t been here.”
“Not a problem. If you need anything, just walk across the hall. I’ll leave the door open a little bit,” she whispers as she stands up to leave.
“Okay.”
“Sweet dreams, baby girl,” she coos, lightly brushing her fingers across Aurora’s rosy cheek before looking back to Mark. “I’ll come see you guys again the next time I hear her wake up, okay?”
He nods. He wants to say that he can handle her himself, but he knows that probably isn’t true. Not yet, at least. “Thank you.”
Naomi leaves, closing the door part way behind her. Now it’s just the two of them, father and daughter.
“I’m really sorry about this, kid,” Mark whispers apologetically as he carefully shifts so that he can sit up against the, thankfully, padded headboard of the bed. “I’m still learning here, but I promise I won’t make that mistake again.”
Aurora responds with a small noise, stopping for a moment to catch her breath and then going straight back to eating. He looks down at her, in awe of how small she looks when cradled in his arms. It’s amazing. She wasn’t even here a few days ago, and now, here she is-snuggled against him, eating, breathing, living, perfect. It’s surreal.
But it is also agonizingly bittersweet.
A few days ago, he was trying to ignore Addison’s approaching due date, and right now, he is 3000 miles away, living in her Spanish-style Santa Monica home, figuring out how to care for their newborn daughter, and dealing with the aftermath of her death. A few days ago, Addison was alive and blissfully happy, a woman so looking forward to motherhood, and now… she isn’t anything.
Just as he thinks he can’t take this reality for another second, Aurora gurgles, and his attention is back on her. While he zoned out, he must have shifted her oddly because she now has a trail of formula and baby drool dribbling out of her mouth and down her chin. Or maybe she just spit up. He doesn’t know, but he repositions her a little anyway, and she calmly and contently goes back to eating. Her eyes peek over the top of her bottle, and she gazes up at him, blinking sleepily as she had the very first time he held her. He knows that he probably looks like a fuzzy blob to her at this point in her life, but there is something comforting about the way her little eyes look at him. It’s the same comfort he feels when she wraps her little hand around one of his fingers, and despite the fact that he doesn’t always know what she needs yet, he likes to think it means she likes him. Outside of the OR, people typically do not have a lot of faith in him, and really, that is mostly his fault, but Aurora seems to have an innate trust in him. He just hopes he doesn’t somehow ruin it. He wants to be different, someone she can look up to, because she has already lost so much. He wants to keep her safe. He wants to be able to give her the life Addison would have wanted to give her. He just isn’t sure how to do it.
“Listen, I know we don’t know each other very well yet, but you’re still my daughter, and I… I love you,” he murmurs quietly, knowing that the last (and only other) person he said those three words to was Addison. This is the first time he has been alone with his little girl long enough to actually talk to her, and it feels both strange and completely natural at the same time. “I honestly don’t know how we are going to do this without your mom, but we don’t really have a choice, so if you could please be a good kid and try to fight off all of your Sloan genes and all of the Montgomery genes that can make Archer such a pain in the ass, I would really appreciate it. I need all the help I can get,” he tells her. “I’m glad you’re here, though. I know that the mood around here sucks, and everyone is so caught up in other stuff right now when the attention should all be on you, but we really are happy to have you. Really. And I hope you know that.”
She falls asleep minutes after finishing her bottle, but instead of immediately placing her back in the bassinet, he feels compelled to hold her for a little longer, studying her features and watching her breathe. What he feels for her already is indescribable, and he wants to make sure she knows that he is here and that she is safe, wanted, and loved. His own parents never gave him that, so if he can somehow convey that to her, he knows it’s at least a decent start.
xx
Next chapter: here